First Place
by MisakiXRevive
Summary: Never let it be said that Shinichi didn't have his own daydreams but maybe he should have left it as one. It wasn't only difficult to act the whole day but also exhausting. And to add insult to injury, the police were searching for their, ahem, anonymous friendly helper who had broken a few to many laws to be excused... No that that had anything to do with Shinichi. ShinichixKaito
1. Chapter 1- Rewriting Expectations

Shinichi had always loved a good mystery, may it be a secret code, a murder case or just another magic trick- even though he would never admit it, he liked watching a competent magician at work. It was challenging but at the same time something he should be able to do to relax because there was no real need, pressure to solve it. Should, being the 'magic' word here. The whole relaxing part was ruined every time his father took appearance and thought it was necessary to quiz him just to tell him that he had done something wrong, _again._ And while solving mysteries was fun, Shinichi had quickly learned that being told that his deduction -for the lack of a better word- sucked, was no fun.

He felt like Watson the second he was next to his dad, desperately trying (and failing because there was no way John Watson would ever be able to) to become Sherlock Holmes (not literally). Not that he would ever tell his dad that. His head was already big enough without Shinichi adding his input thank-you-very-much.

But Shinichi _really_ wanted to be like Holmes. Holmes was everything he ever wanted to be; cool, composed, brimming with intelligence and refinement and having deduction skills most people c_ouldn't even hope_ to attain. And if that described his dad even a little bit, he wasn't sour about it.

Even if he was Watson right now (only without the shooting skills and doctor experience) it was his ambition to become a better detective than his dad (who didn't even want to be a detective. Mycroft would maybe be closer to his usual attitude?). To work towards that goal, he would even endure the smug smile his dad send him every time Shinichi did something wrong.

Like now.

His dad had started to write a new series after his old manuscript had gotten missing somewhere (Shinchi hadn't really been paying attention because the television had just spoken about another shooting in the Haido district Shinichi was sure was linked with other seemingly random shootings. He presumed they were the work of the same person or group but except the bullets found no other evidence had been gathered- no blood, nothing. The pistol, or unlikely pistols, used hadn't been able to be tracked yet, nor the smuggler route they must have come from.) and had given it to him to, he quoted, "Test his deduction skills".

The expectant but at the same time face full of mirth told him that his father was only waiting for him to give up the ordeal unsuccessfully. Sadly, the way it was going right now, he would really have to. He glanced at his mother and saw the same amused face looking back, mocking him, causing him to turn around stubbornly to try to find out who the Night Baron was. Again the language barrier stumped him.

Too many kanji looked back at him and he contemplated using a dictionary for a second before imagining the look _that_ would get him and he discarded that idea. Glaring at the sheet, he started anew. Maybe this time he would be able to guess more words out of the context. Painstakingly, sentence for sentence, he tried to figure out the meaning all the while ignoring the stares he could almost feel on his back head. He didn't even have to imagine them to be pumpkins- he was way to used to this scrutiny.

He glared at his newest sentence which started with 'So-shi-te' (And) and a kanji that read 'he-ra'. From the rest of the sentence he could guess that it meant 'ima', with other words 'now' but was stumped on the last word which he thought should be a verb but was a noun (probably). Shinichi wondered if his dad had written a story with lot's of complicated kanji just to spite him for a second but on second thought that sounded as unlikely as Holmes praising Watson's books for being accurate. The worst part was that he wasn't even sure that he would be able to solve this mystery even when he had decoded the papers. Despite not having understood every word, he had been- no, _was_ quite sure he had gotten all the important information. Another dark look directed towards the soon-to-be novel is his hands and Shinichi continued with new vigor trying to outmatch his dad.

Sherlock Holmes hadn't become the best detective in the world by giving up on his cases, after all.

Five hours later Shinichi still hadn't figured out who the Night Baron was and had only gained an headache and around thirty kanji for his troubles. He had also found out that he had been writing the hiragana 'ne' wrong all along. Damn 'I' being written before the 'n' shape with the loop on the end. It was already nine o'clock by now and no matter how negligent his parents were, his mom or his dad would surely come soon to force him to give up. After all he hadn't eaten anything since coming home from elementary school. He had to hold back a snicker when he remembered that Ran had had to eat her mother's food because her father had been forced by Kisaki-san to 'spare some expenses'. Eating outside thus wasn't possible -at least not without occurring her wrath. Sometimes he really felt sorry for Ran but then remembered that Kisaki-san had always been a loving mother towards Ran. He didn't know what the witch had against him- though he had a hunch that a big part of her aggression towards him stemmed from Ran and him playing doctor...

He let the manuscript fall back on the table and leaned back on his seat. He couldn't believe that he got the aggro even though it had been _Ran's idea_. Seriously, it wasn't like two six year old's would actually do something. Shinichi felt himself blush- the witch had gone to his parents which had led to the talk. The worst part was the fact that his mother of all people had given him **the talk**. Thus it had been very explicit and had covered anything from puberty to S and M games. With pictures (he didn't even want to know why or where from).

He hadn't been able to look Ran into the face for _weeks_.

His face was burning by now and he let his head fall against the hard surface of the table, not knowing whether it was because he hoped the pain would do something against his blush, to hide himself or to cool his skin down before his parents came in and saw his blush...

That thought effectively drained all his blood from his face and he had to repress a shiver. _Too scary._

He looked back at the clock and frowned. His parents were late. Had it been any other day than today, the day his dad had given him the unfinished story he had written, he would have thought that it was the day his parents finally forgot they had a six year old son sitting in the library waiting for them and flown to Australia. But there was no way they- his dad would forget another chance to rub it under his nose that he was smarter than Shinichi was.

Maybe they had a guest? It wouldn't be unlike them to get caught up on catching up with each other to forget his existence for a few hours, even if his mother generally at least introduced him in a way it felt more that he was a particularly cute and stupid pet than their son- "That's my son, Shinichi. Isn't he cute? He's always mimicking me." Lie, Lie and Lie- so maybe she only lied twice and not thrice- she still lied. Shinichi was mimicking nobody, not even Sherlock Holmes. Sure, he could admit that he was a very avid fan but he was trying to become his own sort of a detective with Holmes most important characteristics as an example. He wasn't actually, actively trying to become Sherlock Holmes. Shinichi just wanted the _position_ as a great detective.

Really, if he was mimicking him, he would ask his parents to buy clothes from the end of the 19th century and a pipe for him. If he was already at it, he could also start taking drugs.

_Right._

He slowly stood up from his half-way comfortable position and cursed when he felt his legs tingling like an ant army was running over it. Seemingly he had sat too long. Walking towards his dad's study in a relaxing pace, he wondered whether going there was really worth it. Shinichi certainly was hungry and curious whom they were talking today with, to lose the track of time this instance but he thought that maybe it was time for him to try to make his own food (surely he could make sandwiches?). And he really didn't want to have to admit that he hadn't been able to deduce who the Night Baron was in front of guests. It was bad enough just to admit it to himself.

Having stopped just short of the door, he slowly turned the doorknob. It didn't make a noise and Shinichi was thankful that his dad was paranoid enough to wake up when he heard a noise in the night, even if it was just his wife or now son going to the toilet. After having seen how sleep deprived Yusaku was, his mum had forced his dad to pay attention that the doors, the walls and the floors were sturdy and or not prone to let sound easily through. When Yusaku had complained about the fact that hearing potential safety hazards would be more difficult, Yukiko had told him that him fainting and breaking his neck by falling down the stairs was a bigger threat. In the end they had decided to spend a huge sum of money on their security system to quell Yusaku's worries. Well, that was what his mum had told him at least.

He slowly pushed the door open, not enough to be visible if one didn't look carefully, and looked into the room through the small space. From his position, he could only see a shag of light brown hair (his mum's) and a pair of black clothed legs sitting on a green armchair.

"... I thought you had a son?", an unfamiliar low and somewhat scratchy voice continued.

"My son, Shinichi, is probably still trying to solve the mystery I gave him." Shinichi almost jumped when he heard his dad's voice near the door he was currently behind. _Probably facing the other direction?_ He didn't like not knowing but opening the door even farther would surely give him away. Had his father looked behind him, he would probably be already exposed.

"Ah, but Shin-chan probably won't be able to solve this one either." His mother chimed in and the visitor laughed.

"Still copying you? That kid never learns." He wasn't copying his father, goddamnit! Shinichi's heart rate slightly increased when they didn't answer right away, he wasn't sure why the urge to know was that potent, but he really wanted to know what his parents would answer. Would they agree? Laugh? Defend him? The former seemed way more likely than the letter.

A slight hum and then the answer:"He's a child. I'll let him have his fun until he sees that being a detective isn't the smart thing to do and comes crying back to me."

The air in his lungs came out with a rush and Shinichi had to hold back a laugh he wasn't sure where it came from.

Forget Watson. He could probably be happy enough to be Molly.

"Yusaku, be a little bit more nicer..." He closed the door before he was able to hear the rest and made his way into his room. Shinichi only remembered that he had been hungry after having shut the door, changed into his pajamas and laid onto his bad. Having put the blanket over his head, he closed his eyes and tried to sleep.

The next time he opened his eyes was due to the chiming of his alarm clock (his mother couldn't be trusted to wake him, so he had taken it upon himself). He wondered why he was so sleepy until he remembered what had happened and that he hadn't been able to sleep for a long time after this like a fool.

It wasn't like he hadn't already suspected that his parents didn't take him seriously. But then who did? He was six for pete's sake . The only people who would actually believe his words were people under five. Not even his peers who were his age really took him seriously. Three weeks into elementary school and he already hated it. The only one he could really stand was Ran but she had to move on and make more friends ultimately, so he had tried it, too. He wasn't going to be a hypocrite, only preaching and never doing himself, after all.

That had proven to be a big failure. Thankfully, he had quickly realized that calling Ran, 'Ran' instead of 'Mouri-san' wasn't going to work. They all took that as an incense to tease them and while Shinichi wasn't blessed with social skills like his mother, even he had seen that it would quickly lead to bullying (his small stature only fanning the fire) or a big 'fight' where he had to show that he was better than them to make them accept him as their leader. But there was no way he could do the latter because Ran- no, Mouri-san would also be in the crossfire and she was still too unsure about herself to manage. So no clinging to each other like they were the last living people on a zombie infested planet (not his words) or calling each other by their first names anymore.

To be frank, it was really time they stopped anyway. As children it might be fine but what about when they grew older? Everyone would think they were in a relationship. And he really didn't want to have a fight with Ran's- Mouri-san's- potential boyfriend she would surely get because she was pretty and cute... Maybe he should continue calling her Ran. A guy who didn't have enough guts to fight against him didn't have any right to be together with her anyway...

He quickly shook of that thought and the weird twinge he got when he thought of Ran and boyfriend in one sentence and walked into 'his' bathroom on the second floor. Having shrugged off his clothes, he stepped into the shower, hoping to ease his mind.

_School really wasn't as bad as he was imagining. _

Sure it was boring, he didn't like his classmates, his teachers, was deadly bored because most of the stuff they learned he already knew or took not even half as long as his classmates to remember and had to coax Ran- Mouri-san- into making other friends than himself because he kinda owed it to her after being the reason she hadn't been able to make any other friends beforehand, but despite this everything was fine.

He just had to find out what the 'fine' part of the whole deal was but when he did he could concentrate on that than the other parts and wouldn't feel like skipping the whole day every time he had school.

Having finished showering, he looked around for his clothes just to remember that he had forgotten to bring something with him, forcing him to use a towel to cover himself up until he could cover himself up in his own room.

Shinichi opened his wardrobe too look for something to wear today _except_ the outfit his mum had bought him recently which consisted of grey shorts, a blue blazer, a white chemise and a big read ribbon (the hell?). He wasn't quite sure if she was serious or joking but one thing was clear; he would never ever wear that awful outfit. _He wasn't a doll!_

After picking out a random T-shirt and trousers, he thought would probably don't stand out that much, he quickly changed into them, ignoring his still wet hair which wet his back thus causing him to hold back a shiver and run over his arms in an effort to warm himself. "Brr... cold."

Traipsing down the stairs, he could already hear his mom making food which positively surprised him. So she hadn't forgotten him today. In some way, being forgotten was also a plus for him because his mum or dad always bought him a book of his wishing when they forgot him (at least when it was semi-important) but he knew that it was bribing, which made reading the books... unpleasant. Though he had to admit that the feeling in his stomach, he couldn't really identify, had almost disappeared. It was uncommon for him to actually feel that 'black' feeling.

Black, because should he have to describe it, that color was the first thing that would come to his mind.

"Good morning, Shin-chan!", she smiled at him when he was in front of the table and Shinichi wondered for a brief moment whether she actually felt bad about what they had said yesterday to the stranger. He parenthetically flopped himself onto a random chair.

Another glance to his mother and the answer screamed at him with a big fat no.

The saddest part was probably that it wasn't only no but 'Of course, not'. With other words, he was being an idiot. "What's wrong? You seem down Shin-chan?", he almost hit the table with his legs out of shock (and that was a feat considered his size) and quickly smoothed his expression into something more natural. Of course she would notice his slip of expression, she _was_ a former actor after all. Holding back a bitter smile, he answered with a simple "No." and asked:"Where's dad? Still sleeping?" _Probably stayed up too long talking with that guest, they forgot him for._

Yukiko accepted his answer like she always did and confirmed his thoughts:"He was late up yesterday, talking with an old friend of his." She shot him a look he couldn't decipher. "You went yesterday to bed without me being able to ask you; Did you manage to figure out who the Night Baron was? Yusaku didn't even tell _me_ no matter what I did!"

"No I didn't." No suprise flashed across her face but Shinichi had to give her credit for her next few lines. "If you figure out something, tell me. Ok?" Her face held the appropriate amount of mischievousness and hope to look realistic even with the wink. _Even though she didn't expect anything._

Despite not eating anything since yesterday noon, Shinichi felt considerably less hungry now. He still nodded and dug in, anyway. He **didn't** need his mum to think he was having issues because he was too stupid and or (?) young for his parents to take seriously. Was he going about it the wrong way or were his parents simply hopeless? To not realize he was serious? Maybe a six year old simply wasn't allowed to be serious or to be taken seriously? Shinichi had heard of more than enough cases where testimonies from kids hadn't been taken seriously or at word value and thus the case had ended up as a cold case. Weren't kids supposed to have equal human rights compared to adults (except these extra regulations made to protect/ educate them)? How should that be possible if statements made by children weren't taken seriously?

But then again he probably was being hypocritical here. It wasn't like he actually took others that seriously. Because, he didn't believe for a second that Matsumoto Fugaku class 2a was serious when he said he would become an astronaut or that Tomioka Hitoshi from class 1b would actually able to become singer with his voice.

That must have been exactly how his parents felt when they saw him. His gushing about Sherlock Holmes probably made everything even worse. Like he was now, he wouldn't be able to make his parents believe him, let alone best his dad. It was hopeless.

Shinichi quickly stood up when he was ready with eating, absently thanked his mother and went back to his room to get a hold of his school bag and put on his red shoes at the entrance. As if timed, the chime chimed at that moment and he went out just to see Ran- Mouri-san- in front of his house.

"Good morning, Shinichi!" She chirped and he wondered how long it would still take for her to remember to call him Kudo-kun from now onward while he walked towards the gate.

"It's Kudo-kun. What are you even doing here? Our school is in another direction."

Ra- Mouri-san flinched like struck and started fiddling with her rosy and frilly dress. "I- I just thought that we hadn't done anything with each other for a while..."

"Idiot." He went out of the gate, took a few steps forward and then looked back at her when she didn't move. "What are you waiting for? School isn't going to wait for you, you know."

Her face lit up and when she showed him a big wide, real smile, Shinichi couldn't help but think that going against his plans _once_ wasn't that bad if it made her happy. But just once, he still was determined to give Ran the free space she needed to make friends, even if it strained their relationship. Without him acting like this Ran would never try to befriend other people- she was way to dependent on him.

It definitely didn't have anything to do with the faint blush on his face.

The walk to school was more quiet than he would have thought. Ran- Mouri-san quickly had gone back into her semi-depressed mood after her initial happiness and he wasn't about to break the silence. Today hadn't been a great day thus far and he really wasn't in the mood to cheer her up (he didn't even know _how_) while he himself just wished this day to be already over.

On the other hand, it had been quite a while since had hung out with Mouri-san and he felt it eating him. Sometimes he wished they had never started elementary school but he knew better. It had been way overdue for R- Mouri-san to learn how to make other friends. There was no guarantee he could always be there for her after all.

Also, there were things he dearly wished not to hear (he had seen enough movies to know about girls-talk). He didn't think he could handle R- Mouri-san gushing about another guy without getting the urge to smoother that bastard.

He blinked when that last thought sank in. _Another_ guy? Somehow that sentence seemed convoluted to him...

His thought process was disturbed when he hear a squeal and saw that the wind was on the verge of fluttering Ran's dress up. She was holding down the front but the back-

Without thinking further, he quickly used his own hand to grab the end of the dress and hold it down.

"Ah..." Shinichi could see that she was heavily blushing and he took a second to realize that he _still had his hand under her the helm of her dress_. Letting the fabric go, he masked his embarrassment (and damn without her reaction he wouldn't have been embarrassed!) and said:"I- If you weren't wearing a dress this wouldn't even have happened." After a moment he added:"Ditz."

"Wha- What! It's not my fault! Stupid Shinichi! Mystery-otaku! You're... You're **an idiot**!" After her proclamation Ran ran off, leaving him behind staring at her back.

"Argh, I don't get it!" He kicked a pebble demonstratively after a few seconds. "What's her problem?"

He hadn't even planned to offend her! Calling her a ditz really wasn't out of borders, considering the things she had thrown at him over the years. Not to mention that she should have been wearing trousers anyway. Spring had started not to long ago and unexpected gusts of wind were common by now after all.

She was almost acting like his mother, completely without logic and any rules.

"Women."

When he saw an old lady staring at him with a disapproving look, he quickened his pace, hoping to get away before the situation became even more uncomfortable. Thankfully there weren't many people around, this being in the more rural part of the city. Most people had already left for work, leaving him in relative silence, except the occasional stranger passing him. Some trees already showed signs of losing their blossoms and even though the sky was more grey than blue, Shinichi had to admit that a beautiful kind of silence lay over this part of the area. A deep breath told him that it smelled of rain, a smell he had learned to love over the years.

"Like the silence before the storm", he remarked wryly and would he have believed in superstition, he would have kicked himself for cursing the day.

The only thing he was looking forward to today was the newest book of 'Detective Samonji' which would be published today. Forcing his parents to buy him that, had taken two hours and in the end he had been forced to use them forgetting him the last time his father had been at a crime scene as a weapon (it had been more like running off to go after the serial murderer but who cared?). It had been really embarrassing, especially because he was sure he had sounded like a needy kid who was hurt just because he hadn't been able to watch the newest re-made Sherlock Holmes movie like his parents had promised him and had had to be hauled back by police car instead -but of course he wouldn't have been inclined to use that as a weapon if his parents had brought him along instead of leaving him behind.

Needless to say, he was happy but wished he could just forget the whole episode how he had gotten his parents to agree (just because he had coaxed them into buying many mystery books till now didn't mean that he had had enough). He didn't ask them for anything else after all and he was sure that his books weren't as expensive as the games and game consoles other children demanded.

By now, he had entered a busier part of the city and Shinichi had to pay more attention to his surroundings in order not to get into danger of being run over. Hopefully Ran was okay. Her sense of direction was awful and he started to feel bad that he hadn't stopped her. They had been going to this school only for a few weeks and Ran surely hadn't gotten used to the way yet. Especially because she had been angry when she left, he feared that she may have gone lost. She tended to think less clearly than usually when she was agitated and her abysmal sense of direction took a dive in a pitch whenever that happened. _He really should have stopped her. _

The sanest action he could take now was to look if he could find her on the way to school. Having decided on an action, he speed up his pace and started to look around, most children around him were with their parents and Shinichi started to wonder what on the earth Ran's parents had been thinking when they let her go alone to school, such a short time after being admitted. It was quite safe in that area and many people with children were around but they should really know better than to let Ran run around without supervision or him around.

In some ways, she really took after her father, at least her ability to go from point A to B was as bad as her fathers.

The closer he got to school, the more nervous he became. _Maybe she had managed?_

He bit his lips and looked harder. The possibility that she hadn't loomed over him and finding her in this big town...

Opening the door to the entrance of the school, he was relieved to see her standing next to a girl he knew was called Suzuki Sonoko, talking quietly about something. Shinichi was so relieved to find her alright that it took a second for him to register that Ran- ah, Mouri-san had addressed him.

"...are you listening Shinichi?"

"Yes, I am- And I told you to call me Kudo."

She furrowed her eyebrows. "But-"

"What did you want to talk about?" He saw Suzuki-san shoot him a look he wasn't sure he was comfortable with.

"About be-before. I'm sorry." Her face looked suitable apologetic for him to believe her but even if she hadn't excused herself, it wouldn't have mattered, his relief that she was fine overshadowing anything else.

"It's fine. I didn't expect anything anyway." He didn't understand the hurt look flashing over her face but he definitely understood that he had done something wrong when she slapped him with force and ran away without another word.

"A-re, a-re, you are an idiot, aren't you? Pour Ran-chan", Sonoko said to him before she slandered off and left him alone in an audience full of interested elementary graders.

Shinichi contemplated running after her but dismissed the thought when he saw that morning assembly would start in three minutes which wasn't enough time to find a place they could be alone to find out what he had done wrong to apologize. Especially considering the fact that a good fifth of the school population was looking out for them after that spectacle.

A few minutes later he stood like the other people in a line in the assembly hall, waiting for their headmaster to finish speaking. Most people around him had a glazed look on their face or were blatantly trying to stifle their yawns. He tried to inconspicuously look out for Ran while ignoring the throbbing on one half of his face but couldn't see her from his place on the row.

Seeing as they wouldn't have enough time to talk between classes, he would have to talk with her come lunch or after school.

It was a relief for everyone when the headmaster had finished his business and assembly ended. Trotting behind the other people of his class, he continued his search.

Despite his best efforts, he only spotted her when they were back to class but when he looked at her, she avoided his eyes and this time it was his turn to almost flinch. At least she had come to class which might be a good sign or not.

Class was boring that day. In his first class, Japanese Language, they only repeated what they had learned yesterday and learnt the new kanji 'ima' he had already mastered yesterday. The short break between two classes which followed was spent with answering the inquiring questions of his peers, he wasn't stupid enough not to know that despite their friendly attitude right now, this was an act of gaining information to make them a leeway should the need arise. With other words, everything he said right now could help him in establishing his position in class or hurt him later on.

He tried to not look at Ran - Mouri-san (what would surely make the situation worse) but to be calm and collected despite the red mark on his face he had seen when he had gone to the toilet. Shinichi knew it was nicely hand shaped and damn Mouri-san had pulled a number over him. Who had known she was this strong? He certainly hadn't.

From what he could see Mouri-san wasn't handling the situation that well and he was relieved when the next class started. Next was 'Moral Education' he really hoped was over soon because no matter what the teacher in front of him said, he wouldn't change just to suit society for no other reason than to please. It wasn't like the other people would actually listen to the teacher- bullying was going to happen with or without the input of Kurama-sensei.

Following that, were two hours of PE he was dreading today more than he would usually have. They would go swimming today but that wasn't his problem -he was a decent swimmer. His problem was that that would mean that the girl-side of his class would have more than enough time to pester R- Mouri-san who was way over herself already. Seriously, one would have thought that growing up with someone like him would have made her resilient to most interactions with children but she seemed unable to interact with people who wouldn't take it lightly to be insulted like him.

Not that his interactions with the male- side of the class were going very well. Until now he hadn't said anything incriminating but he didn't plan on acting stupid in front of his peers when the time came.

It had been bad enough to find out that none of them had ever picked up a Sherlock Holmes book in their life. The only thing he had in common with some of them was liking soccer and the Gomera- series but there was only so much you could talk about soccer and Gomera and the second he had criticized the Gomera's special effects- "Blood doesn't splatter like that!"- the conversation had quickly become uncomfortable.

Shinichi really didn't like hanging out with children, despite knowing he was a child himself but at the same time knew that spending time with an adult or teenager wasn't much better either. After all _not only_ most children had the tolerance of a resident class- bully seeing its intended target walk into the classroom clothed in a pink tutu as a guy, wearing black stockings and waving around a flag saying 'I AM BETTER THAN YOU AND I KNOW IT BECAUSE I'M PRETTY!'.

_That_ would go over well.

Like he had deduced, Mouri-san was bothered the whole lesson until the girl known as Suzuki Sonoko cut in. He wasn't sure about the content of the conversation but it wasn't about R- Mouri-san seeing as she relaxed. It was a miracle nobody saw him looking over to where she was every few minutes but he supposed that he was finally getting better at acting even if fooling his parents was mostly unsuccessful.

After showering, lunch time came where Shinichi was ready to jump of his chair the second Mouri-san left her seat. He really needed to catch up with her before she went home because even if he was ready to strain their relationship for a bit for her sake, he really didn't want things to go sour between them. Shinchi wouldn't relinquish his position as best friend that quickly.

The second he saw her leave her seat, he stood up, bid a quick farewell to his classmates and put his dirty tray onto the designed place. He was almost out of the door when he heard his teacher call after him that he was supposed to replace Kawada Chiaki today on cleaning duty but left without turning around, hoping she would believe him later onward when he said that he hadn't heard her anymore (telling her that he had had better things to do than to listen to her, wasn't the way to go).

When he was out of the classroom, he ran into the direction he had seen Ra- Mouri-san go but stopped when he saw her talking with other girls. She was laughing and her posture was relaxed, so he just looked until she was out of his view because she had taken the stairs leading to the first floor. There was no use in holding her back now, when she was finally getting along with them so he swore to resolve this issue later and went back to his classroom where he was greeted by a disapproving look from his teacher.

"Ah, sorry. I... had to go to the toilet..." He tried to look suitably mortified and sorry. When her look didn't wield, he scratched his cheek, making it look like an unconscious embarrassed gesture and lightly made his lips quiver and his eyebrows scrunch up, looking for all the world like he was on the verge to cry under her hard look. That seemed to do the trick at last and he was free to go and help the others, to tidy up the classroom, who spend the rest of their time there staring at him blatantly while whispering something.

Never mind being uncomfortable, he was sure if he wasn't used to hide his embarrassment he would be blushing like a ripe tomato.

Half an hour later they had finished cleaning the classroom and he left the school, slightly dejected. Even though he hadn't expected this day to be good, this disaster (he had somehow accomplished all by himself) was just ridiculous. He weighed the pro's and con's of going to the Mouri's for a second but quickly shook his head and took the way towards R- Mouri-san's house, his face laced with determination which was rapidly dissolving the closer he came to her place.

Certainly more unsure of himself than he was before, he chimed the clock and slightly started when he saw Kisaki-san open the door. Her face flickered through different emotions in seconds, surprise and dislike being one of the main ones. After taking one real look at his face and the schoolbag attached to his bag and her face twisted in disapproval and slight amusement, surely having understood that the hand-print on his face was Mouri-san's doing.

"Ran, Shinichi-kun is here!", she called over and he heard a thump before a short moment of silence which was only broken when Ran shouted out:"Tell him I'm not here!" Another pause. "And that even if I was I wouldn't want to speak with that deduction nut anyway!"

Kisaki-san sighed:"Well, you heard that she said."

Shinichi furrowed his eyebrows and shot the door a dark look. Fine, he had thought they could actually speak with each other but Ran-hime seemingly had better things to do than to listen to her only friend!

"Then tell her when she comes back-" He raised his tone. "That I think she an dreadfully childish person who should at least have the guts to tell me straight into the face what her problem is!"

"Wha-_What_! If Ran was here she would tell you that _you_ are the problem!", Mouri-san shot back.

"Ah, and then can you tell her that I don't have a single clue why she's snubbing me?! We wouldn't want her to start feeling butt-hurt in her room after all!"

"Hah?!" A few moments later, she stumbled out of her room, her hair a mess and blazing eyes too both. "Then Ran would tell you that it's your fault for being an insensitive jerk and pervert. Detective my ass!"

"Who are you-!... Then I would tell her that she's the only pervert here! Who was the person getting all excited?!"

"YOU were the one grabbing my dress!" She paused for a moment when she recognized her mistake. "I mean... her dress! Uh... argh! **Idiot Shinichi!**"

"Indecent Woman!"

"At least I'm not petty like you!"

"Better petty than stupid!"

She bristled and bellowed:"Who are you calling stupid! You- You pretty boy!"

"Pretty boy?" He blinked and wondered for a moment whether he had heard wrong.

"Right! If you weren't wearing trousers and had a long haircut I wouldn't even know you are a guy!"

_She was challenging his masculinity?_

"That didn't deter you from playing doctor with me though!"

"**You-!**" He had a feeling she would soon become violent if this continued. "We promised each other not to say a word about it anymore! And... and... I only wanted to because I... obviously wanted to know whether you were really a boy!"

"That's why I'm calling you a pervert!"

"I'm not a pervert!"

"Pervert, pervert, pervert, pervert!"

"Shinichi! Stop!"

"Perverted Ran!"

Ran- Mouri-san, oh damn he had called her Ran, hadn't her?, was on the verge to opening her mouth when Kisaki-san cut in with a decisive voice:"Alright, you two, stop!"

She looked mad, though not as mad as when she had found them playing doctor, and was glaring at them both.

"I can't believe I heard you using such language, Ran!" Kisaki-san turned to him. "Shinichi-kun, I _will_ have a word with your parents about your behavior at a later time, so go home for now."

He took a last glance at Ran who was pouting while looking ashamed at the same time and turned around, marching to his house in a worse mood than he had left it.

When he was home, he went up to his room without speaking with either of his parents, hoping to avoid a discussion about proper behavior for a while at least and locked the door.

More than twenty minutes later, he had finished his homework and was trying to read an old Holmes book instead of the new Samonji one, he heard the telephone ringing and her his mum murmuring. The following silence (_Oh, Kami, she had probably gone to his dad!_) was worse than an immediate confront would have been.

A knock on his door and he almost jumped, his heart beating wildly. "Shinichi, open the door." The aloof voice of his dad demanded. All blood left his face and he started to look around for a place to hide frantically, knowing that it was fruitless. The thought of jumping out of the window was discarded, he could very well die from falling out of the window of the second floor.

"N-", he cleared his throat. "No?" Shinichi winced when that came out as a question. How pathetic could he be really?

"Shinichi." His dad's voice was sterner now, causing Shinichi to flinch before standing up to open his door. His mother was also standing next to his dad, staring him down and Shinichi couldn't help but think that maybe being allowed almost everything without getting scolded wasn't favorable in this situation. Normal elementary students had already built a resistance to their parents angry faces, while he had seldomly seen his parents really irritated.

"Shinichi... I heard what you said to Ran-chan." That was the moment her face shifted into one of disappointment which hurt even worse than the anger.

"I didn't lie." Shinichi didn't waver his gaze and looked straight into the faces of his parents. "I'm sorry for raising my tone in front of the Mouri's and in public but I won't take back anything I said because it _is_ the truth."

"You called Kisaki-san's daughter stupid." Yusaku butt in.

_Oh right, that he had done, hadn't he?_

"I just twisted the truth. I don't think that she is always stupid... she just acted less rational than one would expect from her IQ in that moment. It was a momentary fit of insanity."

"You also called her a pervert, very often I might add."

"That was... that was merely my judgement. I don't regret saying it even if I regret the way I said it."

"You thinking that the Mouri's daughter is a 'pervert' has nothing to do with her questioning your manhood?" _Way, too go dad. Use more barely used words so as to make your son as uncomfortable as possible._

"No. I already stated my opinion on that matter before Mouri-san accused me of looking feminine."

He couldn't place the look his dad gave him but was relieved when he said:"Fine, then I demand that you apologize to the Mouri's tomorrow for raising your voice and insulting their daughters intelligence."

"R- Mouri-san doesn't have too?" Shinichi's dad shot him an amused look.

"That girl only spoke the truth. She has no reason to apologize."

_Thank you very much for your vote of confidence._

He contemplated disagreeing with that statement but bit down the bile in his throat and swore to himself that he _would_ apologize for the wrongs he had committed but would get his dad back for that last comment no matter what happened.

His mother looked like she wanted to complain with their solution but followed his father when he went out of his room probably to discuss this issue further with him. Before he was able to close the door, his mum turned around one more time and told him:"Of course you won't get the book anymore."

"What?!"

"It's your punishment!", she chirped and he slammed the door closed, locked it and jumped onto his bed to pound the mattress in an attempt to relieve stress. "_Screw the apology!_", he snarled and threw his pillow against the wall which was satisfying for a few seconds until he remembered that he had to lay his head on it this night again and it was on the floor right now. A neon sign reading '_Bacteria_' flashed in his his head, causing him to scramble up from his bed in an attempt to retrieve the thrown item before it became contaminated even more.

Later, in the evening, he changed his sheets and pillowcase, throwing the old ones carelessly into the laundry basket. Feeling satisfied with his work, he got himself something to eat while skimming over the newspaper his father had left behind. Nothing caught his eye expect a shooting on a thief's heist. Seemingly that thief always announced it when he planned on stealing something and made a show out of hit. "A poster boy for attention- seeking individuals everywhere", Shinichi murmured but couldn't help a grin of excitement from creeping onto his face. A thief, announcing his crimes and not having been caught yet? The best part of this whole deal was that he was using stage magic. _Stage magic._

He couldn't wait to get onto a heist. Someone managing to screw the police over like this must be _good_.

Quickly stuffing the rest of his food into his mouth, he practically ran to the computer room (it didn't have an official name) and started one computer. The time it took for the computer to boot itself up , he ran to his room and got his still unused notebook. His father had laughed at him when he had said he wanted one three weeks ago but had obliged when Shinichi had pestered him.

Three hours later, he had practically everything there was to know about 'Kaitou 1412' and knew absolutely nothing relevant about him. It also was no wonder that the police hadn't caught him yet- they seemingly had abandoned their brains and went with 'determination will prevail!', never mind the fact that Kaitou 1412 had stolen every item without fail despite them giving their best shot.

The guy also had an impressive fan base for a thief (he had never had of a thief who had fans). Sadly, most of the info written on the fan-sites was pure rubbish and while Shinichi also thought that it was likely that Kaitou 1412 was a man, there was no proof.

Still, maybe there was _some_ truth in 'seek and ye shall find', since he had found a picture in one of these sites, one taken before the first official heist in Tokyo.

One photo, the man almost invisible, but still useful. Not only was he obviously carrying a person, he could also be seen flying away into the direction of Ekoda and from the amount of altitude they had been losing (considering a video he had found). Sure, it might be a hoax but considering the fact that it was difficult to turn around while carrying another person and the 45° turn he had taken, there was still the possibility that it wasn't and Shinichi being bored to tears didn't have anything better to do than to research exactly that possibility anyway. He would even concede the fact that it was blatantly stupid to go there and hope to find something on good luck.

Quickly deleting the history and the media player history, he hoped his father wouldn't look any further, Shinichi shut down the device and basically skipped over to his room. There he picked out a seemingly random book on his bookshelf, flicked page 21 open and picked up the Yen-note which laid there.

It wasn't like he had _stolen_ the money. His parents had given him money for an excursion and well, if he hadn't used it there nobody would ever know, right? They never had explicitly said he had to use it either.

Satisfied with his excuse- er, reasoning, he slipped out of the house not expecting anyone to stop him and like usually nobody did. The walk to the train station was peaceful and also ended that way, him thankfully meeting nobody he knew.

He had to admit that he'd been slightly worried he would get into trouble while buying a ticked but the personnel in the station didn't react in any way, except the occasional raised eyebrow, making him contemplate to write a letter of complaint because while he had confidence in his aptitude of taking care of himself, other children couldn't be trusted to be able to get out of trouble.

When the train came, he quickly went in and sat himself down near a sleeping woman, hoping that the other people around him would think she was his guardian. Arriving at the right station, he quickly left the building.

By now it was dark outside and the wind set goosebumps loose all over his skin. It wasn't unbearable but certainly unpleasant and Shinichi _really_ felt like kicking himself for forgetting to bring a jacket.

He quickly noted that down and realized that until now the notebook he had only started using today was already one eights full just from his ramblings- he would have to pay more attention in the future to make clearer notes.

_Ekoda was a nice place,_ Shinichi realized after three hours of walking around randomly, the air was as clean as one could get in a big city and the houses he had seen till now all had a homely feeling. Further down was the industrial area but he had decided on looking around in that part because he didn't think that anyone stealing jewels would live in a flat, considering that most of them had an overseer who checked when someone left and came back. Of course he could climb out of the window, but the probability that one could be seen, considering the fact that it was a lively town was high.

_But then again that man or woman could just live in a place without an overseer._

Putting down himself in this situation was really not helpful, so he just continued on his way not quite merrily but not as unhappy as he had been before he had went in the middle of the night into a random area where Kaitou 1412 might or might not be. That sounded even more stupid thought out loud than before.

Twenty minutes later he had almost reached the edge of the town, only a few houses scattered around. He would have left immediately hadn't he seen the house even farther outside than the ones he was standing near to. His first though was that the land tax must be gigantic, his second that going anywhere by foot must be a pain in the ass and his fourth that somebody really liked Halloween themed things.

"That owner must be rich...", he muttered and went towards the house. Shinichi pondered about whether he should use the way or trek through the _growth_. His choice was made when he heard a noise, he slowly so as not to make a noise walked towards it, trying his absolute best not to get every plant that had grown there into his face. Only a few steps forward and he collided with something warm and very much angry if the high shriek he heard when they both fell down was anything to go by.

"Ouch...", he said quietly while using his hands to lever himself from the floor.

"Ouch?! What is that for an attitude?" The pretty girl under him bit at him. From her height he guessed she was his age. He used his hand to pull her up all the while ignoring the scalding glare she was sending him.

"I'm sorry for running into you." Shinichi said earnestly, hoping that that would quell her anger.

"You're sorry?" She bit out and he got a feeling that this would take a while when her face darkened. "Get on your knees, lick my shoes and beg for forgiveness, you lowlife!"

_Alright, that went to far._

"No" Couldn't she just get over it already even though she was beautiful? His good mood had completely disappeared by now.

"Fine the- Wait, what? No?" The pretty girl looked at him shell shocked as if she had honestly believed him to listen to her. She bit her lip and mumbled almost to herself: "I know my charm isn't perfect yet but a child not to mention a _guy_? His resistance shouldn't be that strong yet..."

She scrutinized him with her pre- okay, what the hell? Pretty, pretty, why did a look at her automatically bring forth that word? Was he seriously _that_ overworked?

"I am Koizumi Akako and I _demand_ you to lick my shoes to make me happy!" Another cute expectant look directed at his face (Seriously what the hell?) and something clicked in his brain.

"Ah,- you're another pervert!"

"**You!**" He was slapped for the second time today and this time totally undeserved and that by a stranger none the less. Shinichi _should_ be furious but he _wasn't_ and he could honestly admit that that really freaked him out. She was good looking but he normally wasn't that superficial!

He glared at her as strongly as he could manage while ignoring his inner cries of 'I can't be this disobedient towards Akako-sama!' (What on the-?!) and said: "What the _hell_ are you doing?"

"I-...what?" The girl's face looked fully freaked out by now (and funny shouldn't that have been his face?).

"I know you're using _something_ what it is or why you were using it in a place like this I don't know but-", he was pushed to a side and felt disoriented when Akako-sa- Koizumi suddenly ran away, shouting at him like a villain in a B class movie:"I won't forget this, you brute!"

_Seriously?_

Five minutes later, when he had gotten his bearing back, Shinichi decided that he had had enough excitement for the day. Out of a habit, checked his surroundings when he came out of the clearing but saw neither someone suspicious nor the girl from before. Shinichi was pretty sure he should probably include the girl into the first section.

Now that she wasn't near him anymore the weird thoughts he had gotten were also gone, supporting his theory of her having used something to confuse his senses. He didn't know what or why though and that bothered him. There was no reason for her to use something with an effect like this in the middle of the night (he didn't have anything to tell him the time) in a place like this. Since she had been going in his direction, she also had been leaving that place, making it unlikely that she had wanted to meet somebody there, at the same time there was no sense in her being there in the first place.

So she probably hadn't applied/ prepared it for someone she would planned on meeting, but it seemed far-fetched to him that she would use it on him. There hadn't been any time to prepare it anyway. That 'she's so pretty' thing had started right when he had seen her the first time and hadn't dimmed in the course of their conversation .

_He didn't get it._ What did a girl around his age want with something like that?

Shinichi shouldn't have come. The way it was going right now, he didn't even know whether he wanted to meet her again or not. Sure, he was curious, sure, this could be a case but what if she used more of that stuff and he actually did what she wanted him to? He shuddered, _Kami that would be so gross._ Finding an antidote to whatever she did use would be his next course of action, he decided. Kaitou 1412 could wait.

It was bad enough to be moaning once over some random girl, no way he was letting it happen twice when he could do something against it. He turned around and walked more briskly than strictly necessary to the train station. In a town this big trains came and went even late at night but he didn't want to risk anything. Hopefully his parents hadn't found out he was gone. Maybe they forgot him and went to bed already?

The possibility wasn't even that small it was just that he somehow always managed to land on the less possible side of the spectrum. Not that he believed into something ridiculous like bad luck. It was all just numbers and chance and he managed to lose that bet quite often. No big deal.

When he was at the train station this time, more people paid attention to him and he barely managed to evade the personal here by running into the train towards Beika.

Sometime that felt like eternity to him but surely wasn't later, he was again at the place he had started from, Beika. Only it was three forty now and he knew that even if it were his parents, they wouldn't let that slide that easily.

With a curse, he started in a sprint.

Ten minutes later, he stood in front of his house, panting but feeling somewhat accomplished. If he went to bed now, he at least would have three hours of sleep. Three and a half if he stretched it. Slowly, so as to not make a noise, he tried to open it but wasn't surprised when it didn't budge an inch. Of course his dad or mum had closed it.

He stared at it ruefully for a moment before proceeding to make a plan to break into his own house, he knew how their security system worked and how to go around it,_ theoretically. _

_Bye, bye three and a half hour of sleep._

"This is great training for the future!", he whispered encouragingly to himself. Shinichi briefly wondered _how often he would have to_- alright change of subject. First breaking in then sleep everything else was distraction.

Thankfully he had left his window open or this would be way more difficult.

He went over to a tree, he thought probably had the right height to make him able to jump over the fence (over 10 kg would trigger the weight sensor) and climbed it. From that angle it would probably be difficult to actually manage without touching the fence at all... And he couldn't see the ground either, considering his size (less than half of the fence) it wouldn't be wise to try without having something to cushion his fall. Maybe if he rolled to reduce the momentum? Shinichi sighed, that was impossible. If he was at least taller...

Honestly was this fence even of any use? Someone with time to prepare could just stack many boxes over each other and jump over the fence. Not that most people knew a sensor like this was used but still, if that person bugged them... He got the sudden urge to check his rooms and resolved himself to do it the next day.

Wait a minute- something to soften the blow? That was perfect! He held back a gleeful chuckle and descended the tree as fast as possible. Three minutes later he had everything he needed. Namely a waste-bag shaped bag just for clothes (he wasn't quite sure what it was called but it didn't really matter right now), full of clothes from the collecting point. It wasn't quite as soft as he'd hoped but it would be enough to soften the blow. Now for throwing it onto the other side... Did this bag even weigh less than 10 kg? It was heavy for him to lift but that didn't mean much considering his strength. If it weighed over 10 kg he was screwed if he didn't manage to throw it over the fence. Maybe he should try to throw in the clothes individually?

Around twenty minutes later, Shinichi had successfully thrown in the clothes and centered it vaguely in one place. It didn't look very safe to him but he figured that he would survive it. It had already taken longer than he would have thought because he had to climb the tree sometimes to check whether he was aiming at the right place. "Alright here goes nothing..."

He jumped but thanks to the tree bark breaking in that moment his momentum was off, him barely missing the fence and instead of landing cleanly on his back on the cushioned area, he landed somewhat awkwardly halfway on his side, making him bite his teeth just to hold the pained gasp that wanted to escape him back.

_Never again_, Shinichi swore to himself and shakily stood up. Taking on long look at the clothes, strewn over the lawn, he started throwing them over the fence onto the street with all his might, hoping that it didn't look like they had been carelessly thrown from this house as much as he feared.

Quietly sneaking back around his house, he stopped when he was under his room's window and started the painful climb, his shoulder throbbing painfully at random intervals, almost making him fall a few times. He never was more relieved to open the window to his room (which would be linked to the electric current had he closed it). Without losing his concentration, he clumsily entered his room, feeling more worn out than he could ever remember feeling.

_At least he hadn't alerted his parents-._

The light flickered on and he cringed when he saw his parents, _both of them- he was so dead_, stare him down.

"Congratulations." Yusaku hummed, his voice sounding anything else but congratulating. "You just broke successfully into your own room."

* * *

><p><em>AN:_

_1. I normally would have used the word football for soccer but for some reason they are using the word 'soccer' in the anime._

_2. Seeing as that Kuroba Kaito who looks almost like a carbon copy of Shinichi can easily disguise himself as a female and as a man and thus has too look androgynous, Shinichi also has too look androgynous._

_3. I never heard the quote "Seek and ye shall find" before in my life, so if my friend was pulling a prank on me, please tell me._

_4. I used 'Kami' here because from what I have seen there's a big difference between what Japanese people think of 'Kami' and we think of god. So everytime I'm using Kami, I mean the Japanese understanding of it not the christian. Swear words are and will be just exactly that, you can change them with any Japanese swear word with about the same amount of feeling and or feelings in it._

_5. They're in Japan and speaking Japanese._

_6. I don't have a beta so every mistake I make is mine._

**Seeing as this is my first my first fan fiction with multiple chapter, I would appreciate constructive critic.**


	2. Chapter 2- The One who Knows Best

Shinichi held back his initial reaction to take a step backward and forced his brain, which was busy telling him what his parents could do to make his life very uncomfortable, to think of an excuse.

Considering the circumstances anything would be better than nothing- he definitely didn't want his dad to find out that he had visited a random place in the night just because of a hunch. Shinichi didn't need the spot that would earn him.

His notebook weighed heavily in his pocket and he hoped that they wouldn't pay attention to the bulge it caused. Ignoring the urge to glance nervously at it, he continued looking straight at his parents, seeing them sizing him up. His dad's gaze fixated on his shoulder after a short while and Shinichi had seriously no idea how he had found that wound. It _was_ hidden under his clothes after all and he had tried to relax both of his shoulders, despite the pain.

"Where were you, Shinichi?!", his mum demanded in a worried tone he wasn't quite sure it wasn't fake. If it was fake then she really deserved her unofficial title as one of the best actors of all times. Her gaze worried over his body like checking for any blemishes she could have missed and the second his dad told her that he had a hurt shoulder, she raised his T-shirt, took a look at his wound- his shoulder was swollen by now, clicked with her tongue and went to get a first aid kit.

That left him alone with his dad for less than half a minute, Yusaku still only looking at him as if expecting him to speak up.

To be frank that was something he wanted to avoid, considering the fact that he still hadn't found an excuse that wouldn't end with him being endlessly teased.

"You shouldn't have used clothes to cushion your fall. They aren't soft enough."

"_You saw that?!_"

"I hadn't expected you to do such a reckless move."

Yukiko entered the room, breezed by his dad and started treating his wound while muttering about "Stupid males and their need to stand out.".

Two minutes later his mum decided she had done everything she could and went back to the place she had been standing at the time he had arrived.

"Where have you been, Shinichi?" Yusaku's eyes were indestructibly. "I've called the Mouri's but their daughter didn't leave her house all evening." _Damn._ Well, it would have been too easy if he could have used Mouri-san as an excuse. "_And_ they still haven't got your apology."

_Oh. That_ apology. Considering what had happened, he had forgotten all about it. _And_ he _wouldn't get_ the book, _he had been looking forward to for more than six months. Six months!_ That reminded him of the fact that he still hadn't gotten Yusaku back for his comment regarding Mouri-san's and his fight...

"I was... consummating my love with a ten year older kleptomaniac high school student who loves stage magic," he said with a straight face and had the pleasure of seeing at least his mum's eyes widening comically. His father just raised an eyebrow, telling him indirectly that it was obvious he was lying. After some seconds his mum seemed to come to the same conclusion and when she shot a poisonous glare at him and crackled her knuckles in a menacing manner, he wondered whether trying to bait them had been really necessary even if his mood had considerably lifted itself.

Seriously, if they had known he was here, they could at least had let him in.

The best part of this kind of revenge was the fact that his dad labeled his sayings as nonsense and thus didn't even think about the clue he had left in it. Some situations just demanded evil cackling and this was one of them.

Too bad that he couldn't let himself be seduced by the temptation.

"I was in school... I had heard there was a ghost walking around at night and wanted to find out the root of these rumors but didn't find anything that could have started them."

Yukiko crinkled her eyebrows, seemingly unsatisfied with his lie but still willing to believe it while his dad blatantly fixated on his hair (a mess, probably spotting leaves, earth and other stuff), shoes (dirty and overworked) and battered clothing (ripped at a few places). When nothing else came forth, he sighed agreeably and said: "Fine, but give me your notebook."

_Oh, shit._

"N- No."

"Ho~, and why not?", Yusaku asked with a smile on his face.

_Because the whole reason he had lied at all was listed there._

"Be-Because I have written something embarrassing in there..."

His dad didn't change his expression and his mum started to watch the scene with avid interest. "Don't worry I won't laugh."

"No way. I have written in there a short story about how I will confess my love to... " _Someone who would be believable..._ "Ran- and what will happen afterwards. Even if you are my father, this isn't something I want anyone to see."

Yusaku looked like he wanted to add something in response but his mum butt in unexpectedly.

"Oh, my! You like Ran-chan?" She made a weird squealing noise. "I can't believe it! I had my suspicions, mind you but to have it confirmed! Shinichi make sure that nobody else steals her away!" Steals her away? Shinichi wondered whether he should be worried until she started to explain to him what he should do or not do in the attempt to court her. Then he knew he should be. "... and when she asks whether she looks good in a dress, no matter how ugly it actually looks, evade her question and say something like 'Great but with this dress you would look even more beautiful! It brings out forth your...' and then just insert a random characteristic about her that makes somewhat sense. Oh, and when you want to buy her jewelry you have to..."

Two thoughts flashed through his head in the course of the speech; one was that _women slash girls were a pain in the ass,_ the second that this could count as a form of torture.

Shinichi dared a look at his dad at saw him glancing at the door as if wanting to bolt. _Note to himself: Never speak about love while being in earshot of girls. Oh, and shopping and jewelry and clothes..._

Ten minutes later his mum was still rambling when Yusaku interrupted her rant gently. "Can you postpone this until tomorrow, Yukiko? It's way beyond Shinichi's bedtime."

She stopped her speech, looking more dejected than Shinichi felt she should be righteously be allowed to."_Fine_ but Shin-chan, you will have to go to school tomorrow. Seeing as time is running out we'll tell you about your punishment tomorrow." His mum winked at the end while smiling, grabbed his dad's arm and went out of his room, almost dragging her husband with her.

When they finally closed his door behind him, he felt strangely tired, as if his body had held back his tiredness until they were gone and he wondered belatedly for a moment whether the adrenaline had been the only thing holding is body awake. How late was it anyway...

A glance at the clock sent him reeling, _only a little bit more than two hours left!_ As quick as possible, he shed his dirty clothes and laid himself into his bed, pushed the covers over his head in an attempt to warm himself and closed his eyes. _He would deal with everything else tomorrow._

Shinichi blinked and barely avoided the soccer ball. It rolled harmlessly out of bounds and his team groaned when they realized that the other team would be in the possession of the ball from now on. A few glares and dark looks were directed at him and he heard someone ask the teacher if they could replace him with somebody else. The teacher said something back in return, probably a positive response seeing as somebody else entered the field. Slowly leaving the space, he had to hold himself visibly back from swaying and rubbed his eyes for the sixteenth time that day.

This day if somehow possible had even started worse than the one before. The second he stood up, he had already fallen backwards thanks to his malfunctioning circulatory system and had hit his head against the bedspread. To his chagrin even that had only held him awake for around ten minutes of nursing his pain before he had went back to his sleep- deprived self.

It had become worse when he had come to school where his first lesson was PE. By now he couldn't even count the number of people who had snarked at him today on two hands anymore.

He fell flat on his face when the supposedly solid surface under his feet _rolled_ and he had to use energy he hadn't even known he had to stop himself from doing a splits and instead face-kissed the floor with his nose. The ground was slightly moist from this early mornings rainfall thus also ruining his PE clothing.

Shinichi stood wobbly up _-his mind still fogged despite the pain-_ and checked his nose. It didn't feel like anything was broken but looking at his scraped elbows, he decided that a visit to the school nurse was exactly what he needed. Maybe he'd even be able to gather some sleep.

Finally taking a look at what had caused his fall in the first place, he cursed when he saw that it was the spare soccer ball his teacher had bought and couldn't help but to let out a slightly strained laugh. Figures that soccer of all things would almost be the end of him.

He let out a low sigh and slowly picked up the ball. Because of his lack of sleep he hadn't been able to _really play_ the game despite the fact that they were actually playing that game today in school time nonetheless (he had been looking forward to this). Even though his legs felt heavy, he started kicking the ball, trying to get it over his head and thump it back without turning around. It didn't work well his first tentative clumsy tries but he slowly went back into his pattern he had somewhat mastered even before entering elementary school. Focusing only on the ball, he slowly blended out his surroundings and found that it was like always easier to think like this, the rhythmic thumping of the ball seeming soothing to him.

His head still felt like it was made out of stuffing but he at least didn't feel like he would fall asleep any second right now. _Soccer really was the best. _

He was so concentrated on his mission (he was trying to speed up his pace a knot by now) that he didn't register that his PE teacher Tomika-sensei had been calling for him until he actually stepped in front of him. The man's eyebrows were drawn low, and his lips built a thin line. The boy quickly stopped kicking the ball and it fell harmlessly onto the floor, jumping a few times and then proceeded to roll away.

"Kudo-kun, while you might have been excluded from the game, I don't allow students to dally-tally around. Go and sit yourself on the bench like everyone else not participating in the game right now is doing." His eyes shortly lingered on the ball he had been using before. "The next time we have P.E. I expect you to to be awake enough to actually show your skill."

"I understand, Tomika-sensei." Shinichi quickly went to the bench, not wanting to prolong the conversation. He could be lucky enough not to have gotten a detention.

Sitting himself down near two classmates of him who were talking about some new game on the market, he let his gaze wander around until one of them actually addressed him.

"You think so, too, don't you Kudo?"

He focused his eyes back onto the duo and looked at the brown haired boy next to him, Toga Shigeaki, who had been the one to drag him into this conversation. _What to tell, what to tell._ Shinichi had no idea what they were actually talking about and he could be agreeing to whatever. In the end he decided on saying the truth. "Sorry, I spaced out, I didn't get enough sleep yesterday because I was up too long reading the new issue of "Gaki Togeshi"."

Half-lies were fine, too.

"Ah, erm... We were talking about the new game "Radiant Blast Droy!", and well, the last boss is pretty BAMF so this one-" He nodded to other boy who scowled at being addressed in this way. "-wasn't able to beat him. The thing is, earlier in the game, you can choose different ways to react to a situation, and if you do a certain mission you can befriend the demon king, Live. By acting like you know nothing you can beat him in one with one blow, after finding out his weakness." Toga-san snickered, seemingly feeling great amusement.

"But that is so un-heroic!", Shinosuki Seitaro but in. "And there should be another way to beat him anyway. Like cutting off his head after a big fight."

"Why does the... hero... want to beat the demon king?"

They both blinked at him like he had said something particularly stupid and Shigeaki-san turned out to be the first to answer him again: "He's the demon king. What other reason would he need?"

Maybe 'Moral Education' was more important than he had thought.

"Do you understand?" Shinosuki-san asked him, almost carefully.

"Yes, I understand very well. The 'hero' is in your game is a racist. So what was your question?" If he derived from seeing their blanc expressions even little bit, he wasn't ashamed.

He was sleep deprived as hell and listening to their explanation of the game had only left him irritated.

"Nothing." At his raised eyebrow, Shinosuki-san came to Toga-san's help.

"Nothing important. We just wanted your opinion on the hero."

Deciding to let it go (he couldn't believe that they hadn't realized that Gaki Togeshi was just a made up name), he nodded and turned away from them, starting to watch the soccer match with little interest. It was quite difficult to actually manage to bring himself not just to nod off. In the end the only saving grace he had was that the second he started to nod off, his head fell, thus raising him awake.

Sitting just there was even worse than standing, it was more comfortable sure but he near the end of the lesson, he barely could keep his eyes open. Because of this he was very relieved when their time was finally over and he could go to the changing rooms. _It would at least,_ he mused, _wake him enough to be able to walk around with half-opened eyes._

When he entered the classroom for 'Japanese Language', it had completely slipped his mind that he had had a fight with Ran, ah, Mouri-san until he actually saw her looking at him. She looked slightly worried despite trying to mask it and he saw her glancing at him over the time of the hour in random intervals. It also became quickly obvious to him that the one trowing erasers at him every time he was falling asleep -or maybe he had been already sleeping for a few seconds- was she.

It became _really_ obvious by the time she had to ask her _other_ neighbor for an eraser because every eraser she had thrown at him till now lay on his desk (he wasn't quite sure why she had been carrying fourteen erasers around with her but he wasn't about to ask).

He felt split over her helping him to stay awake. On one hand it meant that he probably could apologize and their fight would be over. On the other hand he didn't think himself fully responsible and wanted some kind of compensation for being called girly, too. An apology would be fine but he knew that there was a big probability she didn't think she had done any wrong.

Shinichi sighed. In the end, he knew the decision had already been made. No matter what he told himself now, he would later go to her and say sorry because their friendship was more important to him than his pride. That particular part of his brain would just have to suck it up (again) and let the rest rejoice.

Maybe, just maybe, she would even acknowledge the fact that her way of acting wasn't acceptable. That reminded him of the reason why this whole episode had even started. What had he done wrong again? He remembered saying something about not having expected an apology which was perfectly normal since she normally wouldn't bother and, well, he had overstepped some sort of boundary too, so it was fine, wasn't it?

Seriously, what was her problem? There was nothing wrong with what he had said.

The rest of the morning ended quietly and miraculously no teacher called him forward to the blackboard. Even lunch was quiet, nobody really annoyed him while he was eating and Shinichi had to admit he was positively surprised when he saw that his classmates all sat down near his vicinity. He couldn't fathom what he had done that would cause that reaction and only realized why when they started subtly praising his soccer skills (he couldn't believe he had been so sleapy that he hadn't even realized that the rest of his class must have seen him playing with the ball). By the time they had started to lightly joke about his inability to do anything useful today because he was reading "Gaki Togeshi" until late in the night (he still couldn't believe none of them caught on), he had to hold back a laugh at the irony. Despite him having tried to speak with them before, he only got somewhat popular the second he started using his feet instead of his brain?

Sure, his position was still very unsteady but even if he used dry humor while speaking or started talking about Sherlock Holmes, he would be forgiven as long as he showed that he knew something about soccer and starred at the games.

Like this he probably wouldn't make any friends but as long as he had a secure position that was fine with him. He had Ran- Mouri-san, after all.

A look to her side (the girl side) of the classroom showed while he showed success in his mission (somewhat), she was failing badly. No matter how he looked at it, it seemed that she was being interrogated in a deceptively friendly manner by what he assumed would soon be her bullies if he didn't do something. The girls who she had been speaking with yesterday staying out of what they perceived to be none of their business with a healthy distance set between them.

He already had planned what to say when the girl who had helped out Mouri-san in PE included them in her own conversation, disrupting the uncomfortable situation with ease that made him think that she was used to it. Come to think of it, he was sure he had heard the name 'Suzuki' before and quite recently, too. When she looked over to him for a second, he send her a -he hoped- thankful smile she didn't acknowledge in any manner.

Well, that was also fine with him as long as she continued 'saving' Mouri-san not quite literally but still close enough to the definition.

When their teacher said that she had to go somewhere for a while, he didn't even listen anymore.

After eating his lunch, he felt awake enough to actually face the day. That was also ironically the time it went all downhill. In his hast to get away from the classroom, to be _finally_ able to make up with his best friend, he hit his foot against a schoolbag, lost his balance and when he came to himself... Mouri-san spotted a nice wet stain on her outfit (this time a white blouse with short reddish trousers).

He just stared for a second, not even moving from his position on the floor, until he quietly (so as to not alert others) said the thing that she probably had been thinking herself by the look of her face. "It somewhat looks like you just pissed yourself."

Her face went red in seconds and when she grabbed her own bento box, he feared the worst. Shinichi wasn't really surprised when she chucked the content over his head which didn't mean that he wasn't angry though. Grabbing his own bento box, he watched warily when she grabbed her leftover drink and a short face down started. The rest of the class only realized something was going on when Mouri-san threw her drink at him the same time he tried to unsuccessfully throw his food from his bento onto her without letting the bento box go. Only a little bit landed on her but that made her mad enough to grab a random's person drink and hit him straight in the breast with it. It left a pretty stain behind, he disregarded, when he ducked out of another ambush and dived under a table, taking a random girl with him.

"Can I have your bento and and drinks, please?", he quickly asked and the girl nodded with a smile but stayed under the table when he picked up her stuff to make himself ready for round two. By the time he had gotten the bento box and the drink, his classmates were all standing in the corners of the room shouting random encouragement at them, some of them being on Mouri-sans side, some on his.

Mouri-san had, unlike him, armed herself with drinks from wherever without asking which he found unfair _because why was nobody getting angry at her?_ but ignored it in favor of watching his opponent. Deciding that they didn't have much time left, he made the first move and sacrificed his newly acquired milk in an attempt to close on her. She managed to duck under the first salve (the milk) but was hit by the orange juice. Sadly, she used his momentary lapse of judgement when he gloated and splat her own drink- hers being orange juice- straight into his face and was in the motion of throwing her milk when he blindly threw himself at her, both crashing onto the floor, though he made sure to hold her head so that she wouldn't get a concussion which roughed up his already hurt elbows from PE quite a bit.

Her other ammunition fell down without being regarded by either of them.

The second it took her to get her bearing back he used to stuff the content of the only weapon (the bento) he had left down her blouse.

That was also the position their teacher found them in.

He would have laughed at Ran's deer-caught-in-headlight expression if his face hadn't been mirroring hers. They shared a short look with each other and quickly put distance between them.

"Kudo-kun! Mouri-san! Up to the headmaster office, right now!", she barked and both of them nodded obligatory and followed their teacher out of the room towards the headmaster office, ignoring the noise behind them and the food-trail they were leaving behind. While he held himself proudly, Ran- Mouri-san was walking slouched and he started to feel bad when he remembered the problems that would give them. He had already misbehaved three times (badly) in the span two days while Mouri-san had already been chided the day before.

Not to mention that he still had an apology to make. Actually, two if he counted the one for Mouri-san in- even though he believed that despite their fight right now, they were 'good' again. Still, while his parents maybe wouldn't be that hard on him for that fight, he still hadn't been punished for coming back in the middle of the... actually in the morning and Mouri-san's parents wouldn't forgive and forget anything out of principle. They had often expressed their displeasure at their friendship and considering that he would be given the fault for this incident, again, it wouldn't wonder him if they would go and try to come in between their relationship.

The nearer they closed in onto their destination, the paler Mouri-san became until he couldn't bear it anymore and grasped her hand in a fit of insanity. She froze for a second but when he pressed slightly harder, trying to be reassuring, she pressed back and shot him a genuie but somewhat uncertain smile which screamed 'Thank you', 'I'm glad you're here' and 'Everything is fine between us again, right?' at the same time. When he smiled back, the smile she shot him afterwards could have melted ice mountains in seconds.

Even if he had tried, he wouldn't have been able to hold back his blush and when she giggled almost inaudibly at his expense, he glared lightly at her not really meaning it.

_He was glad she was happy again._

Her smile didn't slip off her face until they reached the headmaster's office, she then put on a more appropriate face on and let go of his hand. Nodding to each other in synchronicity they didn't have since weeks, they entered the office.

The headmaster, his surname was Uematsu if Shinichi remembered correctly, took one long look at them and burst out laughing. Shinichi wasn't sure whether it was a good or a bad sign while Mouri-san had stiffened next to him. A look into her face and he could already tell that she had Uemura-san laughing taken as some assurance that they would be thrown from the school or something ridiculous like that.

His teacher didn't have have any weird inclinations like that and when he saw her squaring her jaw, he could already see the rant coming.

"We had a food-fight, me and Mouri-san." He saw her shoot him a short look but ignored it. "I instigated it."

Both the teacher and the headmaster paused at that though his teacher looked shocked in contrary to Uemura-san who looked even more amused now than before even though he hid his cackling. Mouri-san herself just looked nervous and at the same time almost ready to deny his statement.

"Hoho, you say you started it, Kudo-kun?"

"Yes, while it might be true that she... joined me, she only did it after being severely provocated by me."

"Provocated?"

"... I told her, after emptying the drink I had been holding on her clothes, that she looked like a three- year old who had just pissed in her pants just uglier."

"Then I suppose you don't mind having to have to be on cleaning duty until the semester is over while Mouri-kun only has to clean today." _Damn, that was more than three months to go._

He heard Mouri-san gasp but ignored it in favor on answering the question. "No I don't. I suppose that that is what I get for starting a fight."

Shinichi tried not to purse his lips when the headmaster nodded but then Ran- Mouri-san cut in. "Wait! I am the one who is at fault!" She looked on the verge of having a nervous breakdown. Her hands so clammy that she had to repeatedly rub them against her trousers. "I should be the one-!"

He clamped his hand over her mouth and quickly shot her a glance, hoping to convey the 'Shut up!' he couldn't directly say. "Mouri-san is just confused. I am the one at fault here. She just feels pressured because I am popular in class and she feels she will get in trouble for getting me into trouble."

"I see." The headmaster lightly thrummed his hands against the table, in a rhythm that might or might not have been a song he had heard in Professor Agasa's house before. "Then I suppose I'll just have _you two_ on cleaning duty for two weeks."

When their homeroom teacher looked like she wanted to protest, Uemura-san smiled amicably at her. "I'm sure that the other pupils of your class will be happy enough to have to do less work for two weeks, Horigumi-san."

"Very well", she almost spat. "I'll take my leave then." Mouri-san and him both followed quietly, not wanting to aggravate her even more than she already was but then Mouri-san started to pull faces behind her back and soon they had an unspoken bet going on who could reenact the headmasters reaction when he saw them the best. Shinichi thought that he should have won a long time ago but seeing as they had no mirror in the vicinity, Mouri-san stubbornly believed she was right even when he shook his head.

They quickly stopped when they reached their classroom, class 1a, and when Horigumi-sensei turned around to tell them to clean the whole classroom, they were very happy they hadn't been seen by her.

Despite her anger, she had tried to put a smile on her face which was only directed at Mouri-san -seemingly they had found one person who actually believed his flimsy lie-, seeing as the smile was slightly too wide and showed far to much teeth, coupled with the fact that the rest of her face _hadn't moved at all,_ Shinichi could understand why Mouri-san shrinked back.

He just found it slightly unfair that he couldn't pull back because Mouri-san would be even more unsure the second he showed how uncertain he was.

Shinichi thought he might just have found his new bully, i_t was just his luck that it had to be a teacher of all things._ Ironic, considering the fact that he had thought he might have troubles with the children instead.

Thirty minutes later, they were both allowed to go. Because Mouri-san had been embarrassed to go out with the stain he had unintentionally caused and didn't want to wear her gym clothes for some reason, he had given her his jacket to cover it up though he thought that it looked even worse than before. Now the stain was invisible but people were looking even more than usually because it was obvious she wanted to hide something.

There weren't much things one could wish to hide at such a place.

And then even worse were the people who looked at him after looking at her -he had decided on wearing his gym clothes despite them being muddy-, obviously coming to a conclusion he didn't even want to imagine by the way they crinkled their nose and looked away in disgust. Seriously, even though food wasn't falling off them anymore (they had to go wash themselves up before attempting to clean the mess in the classroom), considering the stains on Mouri-sans clothes which were obviously made by orange juice and who knows what, it should be pretty obvious they had been in a food-fight. _Should._

Thankfully Mouri-san was blissfully obvious, happily babbling about how her and her mum had gone to the aquarium on Sunday. He answered in the appropriate places but mostly tuned her off, only half-consciously absorbing information.

"Do you want to go with me there in the future? Shinichi?"

She ignored his "It's Kudo-kun." but paid attention to his next few words. "How should I know what I want in the future? But well, I suppose... right now I want to."

When they came to the point he would have to take the left turn instead of continuing, he just walked by, ignoring Mouri-san's questioning look.

"Didn't you have to go left there?" In some kind of way it was amazing that Mouri-san still had to attach a question mark on the end of that sentence. That didn't mean that he didn't feel like banging his head on the nearest surface available. "I still have to apologize to your parents for my behavior and erm, I'm sorry Mouri-san."

Looking at her hard face he sighed. "Fine, I'm sorry, Ran."

She smiled again but instead of feeling warm, he felt annoyed now. It was a little smug smile, like she actually believed that she had won their battle.

"By the way _Mouri-san_ what were you actually mad about?" Shinichi stressed the 'Mouri-san' to annoy her but looked earnestly inquisitively in the end.

Mouri-san blinked. "You still haven't figured it out? Are you sure you are okay?"

"Okay?"

"You want to become detective, don't you? Like this I think that's impossible. Hm... Ah! Why don't you just become writer like your father?" He almost stopped walking when he heard her words, his heart heavily beating in his chest. Swallowing convulsively he let out a faint sound that sounded neither agreeing nor disagreeing.

_Ran, didn't believe in him either._

In some way that was worse than his parents not believing in him because it was simply so unexpected. Ran had never given him the feeling that she-... No, that was wrong. Ran had never believed in him from the beginning.

_Stupid, stupid, stupid. He really should have known better._

Shinichi tried to act naturally the last few minutes but knew from her slightly furrowing eyebrows that he wasn't succeeding as nicely as he had wanted to. He felt strangely disconnected from everything and even the connection, he thought he had reestablished, was gone. For a moment the girl next to him, seemed like a stranger. A moment later she was Ran again.

When they stood in front of her house he didn't know whether to feel relieved or even more nervous than before.

Having decided on ignoring his problems (small breakdown?) for now, he didn't move when Mouri-san's - _Ran's?_ father opened the door. The second her father saw him he started visibly shaking out of anger, which meant that the school had already called- it made sense, they didn't have cleaning duty today and parents became generally worried when their children came to late from school.

He quickly bit out: "I'm very sorry for the scene I have caused and that I have insulted your daughter. Since I'm in a hurry I'll have to take my leave now. Goodbye!" Shinichi evaded the hand grabbing after him and ran down the stairs, ignoring Mouri-san's father calling after him.

A last look back and he saw Mouri-san telling her father something, looking defiant.

_That was Ran alright._

The walk to his own house passed by in a blur. At some point of time, he had simply stopped to pay attention to his surroundings and moved in autopilot while mulling over the new information he had gotten like a dog gnawing at a bone again and again. It was the same problem he had with everyone else, too.

He wasn't quite sure why he had thought that Mouri-san would be different but it was clear to him that he had been deluding himself to the point of being surprised at hearing the words slip past her lips. That shouldn't happen to him, not if he wanted to become a detective. Lying to himself wasn't something he should practice, he should instead become better at telling the untruth to others (it often became handy when trying to corner a suspect).

At that he was failing. Even Mouri-san of all people (she really wasn't observant) had been able to figure out something was wrong.

Shinichi slowly opened the gate and walked into his house after taking a deep breath.

_And now to his punishment._

Unsurprisingly, nobody greeted him back when he said "I'm home!" He quietly went towards the library where he guessed his parents should be but froze when he saw a brownish red liquid on the floor, it looked like somebody had dragged something quite big to the kitchen and he could see something that looked vaguely like bloody footprints next to it.

Shinichi quietly bent down and touched the liquid with slightly shaky hands. _Maybe his parents were just pulling another prank?_

It felt half-way dry which meant that it was more than thirty minutes ago it had been... left behind if it was blood. A sniff told him exactly what he didn't want to know. It smelt metallic and he felt bile raising up his throat. Quietly stalking forwards, he followed the trail and walked in the kitchen. The track went behind the counter and when he looked behind it, he saw his mum laying down on the floor, a puddle of blood around her, her face hidden behind her hair that had messily fallen around her face.

His heart speed up and the walked steadily forwards until he stood next to her. The moment he wanted to get to onto his knees to look for her pulse he heard movement and a knife was pressed to his throat.

"Got you!" A familiar voice said and he turned around, seeing his dad standing smirking behind him.

"**You-!**", Shinichi snarled and stiffened when his mother behind him moved, a light female laugh mocking him. "It's not funny!", he complained.

"You should have seen your face!", Yukiko told him. "I don't think I've ever seen you that scared."

_Screw you, too._

"The blood?"

"Animal blood", Yusaku explained. "The pork butcher was more than willing to give us some when we asked. Sadly, by the time you had come home it was already dry."

A look to the knife told him it was a prop.

"Why?", Shinichi demanded.

"Well, since you came late home last night-"

The next second both Yusaku and Yukiko were left standing alone, their son having run out of the house with a snarl.

_Screw them, screw them, screw them!_ He ran into a random direction, wishing dearly to throw something at both of his parents but knowing he couldn't do that. What was their problem? Couldn't they just forbid him to watch television or something like other _normal_ parents? There was no reason to go that far!

"_You should have seen your face!_", he bit out in a bad attempt at impersonating his mothers voice.

Shinichi didn't know whether the reminder or his failure feed his anger but the next second, he had speed up his pace again. Seeing that he was running into the direction of the Mouri's house, he turned left and only stopped when he had arrived at Beika Park. By now he was completely out of breath and he used his chance when he saw an empty bench to sit down. Funnily enough the first part of his day seemed like paradise right now.

"I can't believe it...!", he groaned into his hands and hid his face for a moment in them. "This is the worst...!"

He couldn't believe he had just run away instead of discussing his parents behavior like an adult with them. At the same time, he could probably be happy he had left the premises before he had said something he couldn't take back, which had be the reason he had left in the first place.

It was just... Shinichi hadn't been supposed to become that angry. Sure, his parents were most likely certifiable sadists but they hadn't actually meant to-

To what?

_To hurt him?_

Surely not, he wouldn't be hurt by something like this, would be? He was just... investing to much feelings into his parents. That was all. If he stopped everything was fine, would be fine and he could start with his main objective.

Shinichi still had to prove himself to R- Mouri-san, his mum, Yukiko and his dad, Yusaku. And well, the world. But how? The obvious route would be to continue acting like he was and start solving cases in an appropriate age.

But then there was Mouri-san who would probably still spot him, he hadn't thought she was serious until now but he probably had to evaluate that, and his parents who would just continue acting like they were better than him even if they_ weren't anymore. _

He wanted to make an impact.

Leaning back on his bench- well, the one he was sitting on-, he realized now that he had calmed down that there were actually a couple of boys sitting on the bench next to him, one of them crying while clutching onto the other. Shinichi had to admit he was surprised, not because of his lapse in judgement but because he knew it was seen as quite embarrassing for a male part of the human species to cry if it wasn't really dire.

The boy slowly slid nearer to the pair and started to look around, seemingly uninterested in their conversation.

"... even t- though I did my best!" The crying one sobbed. Shinichi couldn't see his face but his brown colored hair was a mess, differently from the other one who was trying to console him and had straight but also brown colored hair.

"Pshh...", subject 'Quiet Voice' whispered in what he probably assumed to be a comforting noise. It sounded more annoyed than comforting which probably was the case because the other was sobbing into his new looking leather jacket. "It's alright. Other mothers have also pretty daughters."

"Do- Don't say some... something used for consoling stupid sobbing girls!", subject 'Loud Noise' wailed and Shinichi almost flinched. Almost. Quiet Voice quickly looked over to him and Shinichi did his best to look like he was sleeping. Seemingly satisfied, Quiet Voice turned around again after a few moments in an attempt to console Loud Noise.

After a few minutes, Loud Noise had finally stopped his... moment... and started to speak not as loud as before. "No."

"No?", Quiet Voice asked carefully.

"I won't give her up!", he sprang up and looking like he wanted to run wherever he planned to go until his voice of reason, Quiet Voice, grabbed his hand and asked him evenly:"What do you plan on doing?"

"I'm going to buy flowers, then I'll write a love letter, afterwards I'll probably write a poem-"

"Wait a minute! You plan on annoying her until she goes out with you?!", Shinichi suspected that the 'annoying' part was an accident and was proven right when Quiet Voice looked guiltily at Loud Noise who didn't even seem to have registered it.

"I'll go after her as long at it takes!"

_Oi, oi. This looked likely to become a stalker case..._

Quiet Voice had seemingly come to a similar conclusion if the twitch on his face was anything to go by and explained in a calm voice as if trying to coax the other into listening. "You'll just look desperate. To make an impact you have to act unassuming and then strike at the right time."

Shinichi blinked. That almost sounded like that game. _'By acting like you know nothing you can beat him in one with one blow...'_

"Act like you are not dangerous an then show your fangs unexpectedly for an impact, huh?"

When two set of eyes fixated on him, he laughed nervously "Ahaha, but I wouldn't know because I'm a child!" and quickly stood up and went out of the park, his cheeks lightly pink.

_Damn, he had given away that he had been listening in their conversation._ And he was still wearing his soiled clothing...

Not feeling like going home yet, he slowly walked through the streets, letting his feet guide him for the second time that day. He mulled over the words while walking, slowly letting the idea sink in.

To be frank it wasn't a particularly good nor safe plan. Definitely not usable in reality but an interesting thing to hold onto and think about. How would his parents react if he actually acted like he had no interest in deducing anymore for years and then bested them?

He wasn't sure. The most likely scenario would be his dad telling him that he had known his plan from the beginning.

Shinichi speed up his pace and grumbled under his breath. Even in his _daydreams_ his dad had to best him. And Mouri-san would...

Furrowing his eyebrows, he thought of possibilities and tried to look for the most likely one. Maybe beat him? She probably would be mad he hadn't told her were her new dress was even though he should have known or something ridiculous like that. The thought that she could have used her brain herself would probably elude her.

Shaking his head he reprimanded himself. Mouri-san didn't deserve that attitude. Still, it seemed quite likely she would get angry. She didn't like to be lied to.

_Even though it wouldn't be lying, at least technically._ Hm...

But what if his dad didn't find out he was acting? He would probably be spell-shocked that someone like Shinichi had managed to best him and there wouldn't be many excuses he would be able to use either.

And his mother... there was probably no bigger failure for her than not to realize that her own family was acting for years and she hadn't realized it. It definitely wouldn't hurt them to become a little bit more humble.

He snickered unobtrusively behind his hand and tried to imagine the look they would have on their faces. If there was one thing his parents hated more than being bested would be to be bested by their son. And Mouri-san, well, it wasn't like it would hurt her if he didn't lie. Shinichi would just have to stop bringing it up and people would naturally forget. Especially Mouri-san and the rest of his classmates (who didn't really know anything in the first place).

They _were_ six after all.

He stopped when he saw he was already near the Beika Library and turned around. _Well, it was not like he would ever actually do it._

The way back was spend by people watching, him seeing a person and trying to figure out their occupation. Some were obvious like students or police officers while other actually took him a while to figure out or he didn't manage. Every person whose job he figured out and was right about, slowly raised his spirit.

Shinichi had only started doing that actively a few weeks ago but he had to admit that it was more fun than he would have thought.

Entering his house, nobody was in sight again and he worried for a moment if they planned an encore until he saw a paper that hadn't been there before pinned on the corkboard in the kitchen, hidden between another note.

"_We've gone out. The food is in the fridge. Love, your beautiful mum._", he read out aloud and scowled when he saw the heart at the end. Shinichi wasn't even sure why she had bothered to write him a note now of all times when she had already forgotten it often enough for him to be used to being alone in this house without any inkling as to where his parents were.

'_Love, your beautiful mum._' He teared the paper in half and threw it into a random trash can.

After that, he went to his room, took out a random pair of pajamas and showered himself. The shower took longer than he would have thought thanks to the orange juice and the random food-bits in his hair.

Having finished his shower, he surveyed the room and remembered that he had been planning on searching it for listening devices. It wasn't likely that he would really find some but what other people called paranoia, had helped him and his parents survive till now, so he wasn't going to disregard his idea just like that.

Now to the difficult part. Where could he find a radio receiver for that?

The most likely place seemed to be indeed his dad's study he was pretty much forbidden from entering without his parents. Really, it wasn't like he would use whatever he found there to go against the law if it wasn't to solve a case.

Shrugging the uncomfortable silence off, he went over to said room and scowled when the door didn't open. As far as he knew, the lock could only be opened by the key Yusaku was holding onto thanks to the electronic chip embedded in it. Shinichi might actually be able to cheat around that but that would take lots of time he didn't have, seeing as he was unsure as to when his parents would come back. He should probably try to find another solution and break into his dad's study on a later date (for training purposes of course).

That only left him with the option of going to Professor Agasa. Sadly, this would definitely result in his parents knowing that he had borrowed something like that which wouldn't actually be that bad because they'd probably (hopefully) just leave it alone. It wasn't the first time he had borrowed weird things from Agasa for his experiments after all.

Shinichi went out of the house, making sure to collect his keys on the way out, and went over to Professor's house. Thankful that no explosions were to be heard, he carefully opened the gate and walked towards the building. Out of habit he lingered a few seconds just short of the door and looked at the numerous windows the professor had insisted on when the house was built to have enough sunlight while working on his inventions. Seemingly he worked better with 'real' light instead of the cold light of light bulbs even if he hadn't really managed to make any great invention either way. Despite his proclamation, Hakase often closed his curtains when he was working, making the whole thing useless. Well, baring the fact that it was sometimes quite a sight to see when the late evening light reflected on said windows.

Having chimed the clock, he waited for a while but didn't hear anything. He slowly went around the house and looked in a window that didn't have its curtains drawn. The inside was empty and seeing the bags strewn on the table, he concluded that Agasa Hakase had probably gone to the supermarket to restock his dwindling food reserves. Considering that breaking in into his house would be plain impolite and unnecessary, Shinichi went back into his own house deciding on coming back to this issue at a later date.

Three hours later, he heard laughing in the house and closed the book he had been reading shut. He shortly pressed his hands against his nose bridge and stood up to open his door and talk to his parents. Shinichi walked towards to where the noises came from and blinked when he saw that his father was kissing his mother deeply, obviously both being slightly intoxicated by the looks of it.

He looked away and made a gagging sound in hope of alerting his parents to his presence but they still took an eternity (about twenty seconds in reality) to stop. When he heard the telltale popping sound (_Ugh!_), he turned around to say something but was interrupted by his mum. "Yusaku stop that~!- Ah, Shin-chan! Your dad and I will be busy for some time, so don't go in our room, okay?" Shinichi nodded when he saw his dad's hand disappear under his mum's clothing and quickly went back into his room and shut the door. Thankfully the walls were think. Situations like this made him think that maybe his mum had lied when she said they had paid attention to the thickness and sturdiness of the walls and of the floors because Yusaku had been disturbed by noise.

It was more likely that they had thought that the guests or their baby son would be disturbed by t_he noise they would be making._

He jumped back onto his bad, throwing his slippers off while jumping and laid himself onto his back. Shinichi just had been snubbed for _sex_ of all things and that after making such an dramatic scene when he had left. He quickly put his pillow over his head, not knowing if the sound he had heard was real or imagined and definitely not willing to find out. The walls weren't sound-proof after all.

Being bored out of his mind, he looked around in his room and sighed when he found nothing to fixate on what wouldn't bore him without the use of both hands. He tried to think about something interesting but the only thing that came up was his daydream he had been pursuing. But that wasn't anything he wanted to spend more time thinking on. Doing that would be like imagining for endless hours how it would be to be rich instead of doing something for it.

He had to admit that the idea pleased him though.

Twenty minutes later, he moved from his position, not being able to bear the boredom anymore. Thankfully, he didn't hear anything when he moved the cushion from his head, feeling like he had had a big ordeal behind him. Had he actually been still sleepy, he would have slept but while his body felt heavy and his mind muddled, he just couldn't sleep.

That feeling was just plain annoying, so with a clumsy movement, he grabbed his book and continued where he had left off.

It was already seven fifty o'clock when he remembered that he still had homework to do and with a heavy sigh he stood up and went to work. Ten minutes later he had finished and was staring at the wall while contemplating whether going to eat something was worth breaking the comfortable lull he was in.

His parents hadn't shown their faces since he had seen them the last time and Shinichi had an incling that they were probably still sleeping, exhausted by their activities...

_Gaw, bad train of thought._

Leaving the room, he went straight for the kitchen, determined to make himself something eatable. Seeing as he couldn't cook yet, he took out bread, clumsily cut of a slice of bread that was about double as thick on the left side than on the right side. He scowled at it but proceeded to cut some cheese, concentrating so as to not hurt himself. Using a knife wasn't alien to him, even if he normally cut smaller things, so he managed without any bigger sacrifices for his meal than his slightly bruised pride at his ineptitude.

Having eaten the food, he got himself ready for bed and this time, he fell quickly asleep.

The next morning both Yusaku and Yukiko joined him in the morning, eating breakfast. They looked cheerier than usually and the first thing his mother did was to give him a hug destined to kill somebody of asphyxiation one day. When she finally let him go, it didn't take long for her to be lip-locked with his dad again and Shinichi had to hold himself back from telling them to get a room. He was watching after all.

Everything went quite well, him ignoring his parents while his parents flirted with each other shamelessly had never showed any negative results so far. Well, if you ignored the fact that he was seriously disgusted, especially when Yusaku or Yukiko started to get... touchier.

At least until his mum and dad stopped flirting with each other. His dad started too look at some documents, making him curious. He slowly craned his neck in an effort to get a glimpse at them when his dad took pity on him and gave them to him.

"Security Systems- Make your house safe with newest ideas from SecureRopeDeluxe?", he slowly read, making sure not to make any mistakes with the kanji.

"You have been content with them till now, so why?" Shinichi saw a weird expression flash across the others face before his dad took the sheets back.

"Because they've been breached, obviously."

Understanding dawned on his face and he said in a controlled manner:" But they have been breached by _me._ I already knew everything I had to be careful for... and I'm sure that you and mum would be able to break into this house, too."

'And I'm sure you know that, too' wasn't spoken out loudly but definitely hang in the air between them.

"You are a six, no matter how smart you think you are. Even if you knew where the traps were, you shouldn't have been able to." Yusaku continued, maybe not seeing or maybe not caring that Shinichi had gripped the table hard enough so that his knuckles had become white. "The security system is obviously not enough."

The system was not enough... Shinichi hadn't simply done something to be proud of (Well, ignoring the reason why he had done so in the first place) but the _security system_ simply wasn't good enough. It wasn't his achievemt but merely the security systems fault. Of course it was- that was exactly how it had always been.

As long as he didn't do something so great that even his parents were shocked, it would always just be _not difficult enough._

"Shin-chan. Do you want seconds?" His mum glanced over to his father. "Of course your father will have to serve us. " A smile was send in his direction but he merely shook his head, stood up from his seat and readied himself for the day.

Still half-way immersed in his thoughts, he startled when he saw Mouri-san behind the gate, her appearance a little bit disordered. She smiled at him between deep breaths and he, despite feeling out of it, strained himself to smile back.

"Good morning, Mouri-san."

"It's Ran. R-A-N"

"Let's go", he said ignoring her reprimand and started walking in a steady but fast pace making sure that Mouri-san could keep up with him. She was walking next to him in silence, feeling that something was off with him today but despite that fact walking with her felt more comfortable than he would have thought. He was sure that if he didn't say something, she would be quiet the whole way letting him mull over his thoughts to come to a conclusion while walking next to him as a reminder that he could always ask her.

Not that it really applied in this situation but he did appreciate the thought and that she came at all which was the only reason he started a conversation.

"What did your parents say?"

Mouri-san looked at him, wearing a surprised expression, seemingly not getting why he had started talking with her. "Ah... They were both mad and...-" A pause. "Never mind. It's not important."

"They told you to stop hanging out with me but you ignored them and ran away this morning to walk with me to school?"

She almost fell over her own feet and stared at him in shock. "H-How?"

"Your appearance. At first I got suspicious because you didn't chime. You're probably not conscious of it but you always chime exactly three times, waiting for me to come out. The reason you didn't do it today was obviously as to not gain attention. Seeing as it is obviously not me you're hiding from, my parents would be the only other possibility. They would also be the first people asked if you left your house without permission, making my theory more probable. Not to forget that your hair your mother always brushes after you brush it is more chaotic than usually- probably because Kisaki-san always goes over it a few minutes before you leave, wanting you to manage brushing them by yourself but not wanting you to go to school without looking your best. You were also out of breath when you came and your shoelaces weren't tied orderly because you ran away from your house before your parents could catch you. Am I right?", he couldn't hold back his shit-eating grin when she looked at him flabbergasted.

"Wow, like magic! Exactly like your dad!"

The smile couldn't have slipped faster of his face. "My dad?"

"Uhuh", she nodded. "He did exactly the same thing to dad the last time. My dad was really mad after that though. Saying something about outsiders who should stop mocking the police."

"I see..."

"You learned it from him, right? He's really cool!" Mouri-san looked at him like expecting him to chime in in her gushing, probably thinking he would be happy to hear praise for his dad. And _he was,_ he just wasn't happy that the fact that he had done something great got written of like this.

"I... Yeah, I copied it from my dad...", a weak chuckle followed and Shinichi felt like kicking himself when Mouri-san looked placated. He didn't even know why he had lied but for some reason, he didn't feel like insisting on the fact that it was his credit and not his dad's.

"Like I thought! Maybe I should become a detective... What do you think Shinichi?"

"H-huh, why not. I bet you would make it far..." When she smiled at him, seemingly happy to hear his evaluation, Shinichi couldn't help it; he felt cheated.

"Female elementary school detective Mouri Ran!", she posed herself in what she probably assumed was a cool detectives pose; her left hand holding her bangs from her face, her left holding her chin while her face took on a fake smirk, her weight concentrated on her left foot.

He couldn't help it- he started laughing like crazy, trying not to double over his own feet. Another look into her scandalized face sent him finally carrying on the floor, probably ruining his clothing again, clutching his rips which had started hurting by now.

"Shinichi!"

"So-" Another laugh. "Sorry, sorry." A deep breath and he bit his lip to hold back further incidents. Standing up slowly, he ignored her pout and continued on his way. She followed him moodily, sending him dark looks from time to time but didn't move from his side, content to show her displeasure like this.

By the time the school came to sight, he was slightly annoyed by her antics and very unhappy when he remembered the next class they would be having. It was music and he was sure he would be the one getting called out again. For some reason the music teacher loved teasing him, making the music classes always a pain.

With a sigh he entered the school grounds and proceeded to walk to the entrance while answering to greetings from his peers. By the time they had reached the shoe lockers nobody had made any move to greet the girl walking next to him who had tried a few times to say something but was ignored or just managed a feeble weak try.

She looked really down, down enough for Shinichi to turn around to her to try to cheer her up when he was surprised by Suzuki-san appearing behind her with a cheery "Good morning, Ran-chan!", she also smiled at Mouri-san who tentatively smiled back and put her shoes into her locker, putting on new ones. He was still staring at her with a contemplating expression (from the way she acted towards Mouri-san, she may be very well a candidate to befriend her...) when she was leaving until Mouri-san stepped on his foot. With a curse, he jumped back and glared at her.

"What on the earth?! Do you have aggression issues? Too much testosterone?", he snapped but she only stared at him for a short second before turning around and marching away with to much swing on her hips towards the classroom. He flinched when she walked against the wall thanks to her 'flair' and filed away those that laughed at her for it. It could be important on a later date after all and he didn't like it when other people laughed at Ran... Yes, he did it sometimes but she laughed at him, too, so they were even.

With a grumble, he walked towards the classroom, hoping she would leave him alone for once.

Forty-five minutes later he opened the same door he had walked in before he had been endlessly pestered by his music teacher, his mood only having gone worse over the duration of the time. Mouri-san who normally at least tried to help him out had ignored him the whole hour, not even looking at him which had made it quite obvious that she was mad at him for his other classmates considering the fact that he had been picked out (again) and had stood in front of his teacher the whole time. Thanks to that his throat was dry and scratchy now, resulting in him gulping down lots of water on the way to arithmetic.

He was walking with three others who were bitching about the teachers unfairness for him. To be frank, the whole discussion was needless and way to time-consuming for him but he played his part so he wouldn't loose his still very shaky position in class.

"Did you and Mouri-san have a fight? She was totally looking away the whole time."

"Ah... Yes. Though I'm not quite sure what happened...", he answered Kazuyoshi Satoru, seeing as there was no reason to lie (it was really obvious).

Loud laughter followed and Toga, who really should know better after the episode the day before, put his arm around his shoulder. "That's girls for you. Just say sorry if you don't mean it."

"Or compliment her dress", Shinosuki chimed in. Shinichi made a noise that could be taken any way and adjusted hi back-pack, automatically removing the other boys arm from his shoulder.

"She wasn't wearing a dress Toga!"

"Pft. Then her trousers. It doesn't really matter either way, Shinosuki."

"I think it matters..."

"Nobody asked **you** Kazuyoshi!"

"Screw you, just screw you guys. Well, except Kudo-kun."

"Yes, Kudo our angel! Save us!", Toga shouted and tried to jump on Shinichi who jumped out of the way, letting Toga stumble a bit.

"You were rejected by Kudo, Toga!", Shinosuki cat-called and evaded Toga's half-hearted attack.

Shinichi let them banter until they were near the classroom. "Stop it guys, Horigume-sensei is going to give you detention and while I don't care what happens to you, she'll definitely get me into trouble too."

"Ow! That's harsh Kudo."

"No wonder you tried to jump him. I wouldn't care about you either..."

"Shinosuki-!"

"Let's go before your angel gets mad Toga."

"Tche. Nobody asked you Kazuyoshi."

"I answered anyway."

They shut up when he shot them a look and he opened the door seeing Horigume narrowing her eyes when he came in.

"Good luck, Kudo-kun!", whispered Kazuyoshi before patting his back lightly and going to his seat. Shinichi repressed the urge to tell him to leave his hands on himself (really, they were way to touchy) and walked to his assigned seat. He _would_ find a way to stop them from being so damn affectionate even if he had to use a soccer ball for it.

* * *

><p><em>AN: _  
><em>1. Tomioka Hitoshi and Tomika-sensei are different people and not a spelling mistake.<em>  
><em>2. I'm using the suffix -sensei instead of teacher because it doesn't mean the same. <em>  
><em>The suffix -sensei can be used for many different professions and also can show whether one is ranked higher than the other (like about every suffix in Japan).<em>  
><em>3. "I'm home" ("Tadaima") is a standard thing to say for Japanese people when coming back to their own house. It's also used for arriving at one's workplace but then it's translated as "I'm back". <em>  
><em>Normally somebody answers with "Welcome home" ("Okaerinasai" or the shortened form "Okaeri"), when it's used for a person coming to work it's "Welcome back".<em>  
><em>4. I thought long about the fact whether I should write "Hakase" or "Professor". At first I wanted to write professor instead but then I recognized that writing "Professor has gone..." sounds just weird (and is gramatically wrong) and "The professor has gone..." would be an alternative but would also sound too distant. They also often adress him as Hakase instead of his name so I would be writing "Kudo-kun should really be paying more attention, right, professor?"<em>  
><em>Bah.<em>  
><em>In the end I decided on calling him "Professor" when they're actually adressing the fact he is one and "Hakase" when they're just addressing him.<em>

**Wow, I have to admit that I felt all warm and happy inside when I saw that people had favorited and started following the story- but then the reviews came and I'm ashamed to admit I actually squealed.**


End file.
